MU wrote:
On 12 Aug 2004 21:40:43 GMT, jamie wrote:

Did you read the study extract?

Above lies a perfect example of why discussions outside of the science
community regarding "extracts", citations and (non)empirical studies have
little to no merit in alt.diet.support groups.

If you have access to the full study, rather than the extract, I'd
like to see it. It might answer my questions about the extract.

It was less a matter, IMO, of any problem discussing an extract in a
laypersons' group, than misleading math used in the way it's often
used in advertisements. The sixty-six percent more calories cited
from in the study sounds like a lot more than it is, until the "more
than what" number (1100) is actually examined.

It did say the children were ages 12 to 18, ranging from 20 to 100
pounds overweight. Speaking as a 5-foot-tall woman, my frame is about
the height of the average 12 year-old, and surely less active than
a 12 to 18 year-old, and 1100 calories would be very low for me.
I maintain goal at about 1400 to 1600 calories, and I'm not all
that active (although I have very large, dense bones for my height,
and a fortunate genetic tendency to be somewhat more muscley than my
activity level suggests, which skews my numbers from the average.)

1100 would be even lower for the older, larger teens in the study,
and those with a lot to lose. It's very possible that the ones on
the 1100 cal diet didn't have as much energy to be as active as the
ones eating a few hundred more calories on the low-carb diet, or was
low enough to promote muscle mass loss that would lower their basal
metabolism and reduce the amount of fat loss.

With the limit for the low-fat group set so low, and no further
details, it can't necessarily be assumed that it was low-carbing
accounting for higher losses at ~1700 calories, rather than a
more reasonable calorie level maintaining more muscle mass, and
perhaps energy for more activity.

--
jamie )

"There's a seeker born every minute."